Elected leaders: Big Oil should pay for rising insurance costs

A pair of elected officials from California, including a former insurance commissioner, have joined a growing chorus of voices demanding that fossil fuel companies help shoulder the financial burden of higher insurance costs stemming from extreme weather disasters made worse by climate change.

Across the country, insurance companies are passing on the costs of fossil fueled climate disasters to everyday people through higher rates and declining coverage. Meanwhile, Big Oil companies that knew their products would be responsible for worsening extreme weather continue to rake in billions of dollars in profits and evade responsibility for the growing nationwide insurance crisis.

U.S. Rep. John Garamendi, who previously served as the state’s Insurance Commissioner, and California State Sen. Jerry McNerney, called out this hypocrisy in an Op/Ed in the Mercury News and East Bay Times:

“Instead of turning their backs on California or further raising prices on residents who can’t afford it, insurance companies should turn their sights on the true culprits of climate change: oil and gas companies.

It’s time for insurers to demand that Big Oil and Gas pay their fair share for the massive climate-related economic damage they’ve caused. And it’s time to spare overburdened property owners from more unaffordable rate hikes.

Insurers should follow the lead of states — including California — that have sued Big Oil and Gas to hold them accountable for billions in climate losses.”

Garamendi is now the second former California insurance commissioner to call for the fossil fuel industry to pay their fair share of the state’s growing insurance costs. Dave Jones, who served in the position between 2011 and 2018, urged insurers to hold the fossil fuel industry accountable in a New York Times Op/Ed earlier this year.

With their constituents increasingly struggling to afford insurance, lawmakers are beginning to respond. Legislators in Hawai`i and California have introduced bills that would force insurers to take Big Oil to court before raising rates.

Industry documents show that executives knew their products would worsen extreme weather, but chose to spend decades misleading the public about the problem rather than take action to reduce harm. This deception is at the center of dozens of lawsuits states and cities have filed that seek to finally hold the industry accountable for the devastation of climate change.